# Workaround for using wild cards in phrases and proximity searches(Elastic Search)
**URL:** https://discuss.elastic.co/t/workaround-for-using-wild-cards-in-phrases-and-proximity-searches-elastic-search/18361
**Category:** Elasticsearch
**Created:** [June 27, 2014, 1:23am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/workaround-for-using-wild-cards-in-phrases-and-proximity-searches-elastic-search/18361 "2014-06-27T01:23:33Z")
**Posts on this page:** 2
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@saud\_rehman](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/saud_rehman)
#### Post date: [June 27, 2014, 1:23am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/workaround-for-using-wild-cards-in-phrases-and-proximity-searches-elastic-search/18361/1 "2014-06-27T01:23:33Z")
Problem:
Recently I wanted to do a proximity search on elastic search index. I wanted to search all docs where ‘measles’ and ‘vaccin\*’ were with 25 characters to each other. Plus I wanted both of them to be in order.
The elastic search proximity search wasn’t an option because of two reasons.
1. Proximity search doesn’t support wildcards. e.g (“measles vaccine”)~25 is supported but (“measles vacci\*”)~25 or (“measle\* vacci\*”) is not supported.
2. Proximity search doesn’t check the respect the order of words in phrase e.g (“measles vaccine”)~25 and (“vaccine measles”)~25 will give same results.
Solution:
Few examples to resolve this issue using span\_near
1. (“measles vacci\*”)~25
{
"query": {
"span\_near": {
"clauses": [
{
"span\_or": {
"clauses": [
{
"span\_term": {
"text": "measles"
}
}
]
}
},
{
"span\_or": {
"clauses": [
{
"span\_multi": {
"match": {
"prefix": {
"text": {
"value": "vacci"
}
}
}
}
}
]
}
}
],
"slop": 25,
"in\_order": "true”,
"collect\_payloads": "true"
}
}
}
// in\_order can be used to toggle between ordered or unordered.
1. “measle\* vacci\*”
{
"query": {
"span\_near": {
"clauses": [
{
"span\_or": {
"clauses": [
{
"span\_multi": {
"match": {
"prefix": {
"text": {
"value": "measle"
}
}
}
}
}
]
}
},
{
"span\_or": {
"clauses": [
{
"span\_multi": {
"match": {
"prefix": {
"text": {
"value": "vacci"
}
}
}
}
}
]
}
}
],
"slop": 0,
"in\_order": "true",
"collect\_payloads": "true"
}
}
}
2. Grouping. Now lets assume you want to find all docs where (canada OR toronto OR “North york”) NEAR (measles OR vaccin\*). And they should be near to each other by 30 characters.
{
"query": {
"span\_near": {
"clauses": [
{
"span\_or": {
"clauses": [
{
"span\_near": {
"clauses": [
{
"span\_term": {
"text": "North"
}
},
{
"span\_term": {
"text": "york"
}
}
],
"slop": 0,
"in\_order": "true",
"collect\_payloads": "true"
}
},
{
"span\_term": {
"text": "toronto"
}
},
{
"span\_term": {
"text": "canada"
}
}
]
}
},
{
"span\_or": {
"clauses": [
{
"span\_term": {
"text": "measles"
}
},
{
"span\_multi": {
"match": {
"prefix": {
"text": {
"value": "vaccin"
}
}
}
}
}
]
}
}
],
"slop": 30,
"in\_order": "false",
"collect\_payloads": "true"
}
}
}
If any one knows better solution than this one please comment. Any suggestions how I can build a parser to take query from user e.g (quick AND near(foxes OR rats, toronto OR ontario, 30)) and convert that to elastic search span\_near using above workaround. Boolean operators and parenthesis precedence is what I am finding hard to handle. Any open source PHP library which can help me change user written queries with parenthesis and boolean operator to ES filters.
@shay banon, @ steven @uri: any plans to have such operator support in the query\_string
References:
[http://www.elasticsearch.org/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/0.90/query-dsl-span-near-query.html](http://www.elasticsearch.org/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/0.90/query-dsl-span-near-query.html)
[http://www.elasticsearch.org/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/0.90/query-dsl-span-multi-term-query.html](http://www.elasticsearch.org/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/0.90/query-dsl-span-multi-term-query.html)
[http://www.elasticsearch.org/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/0.90/query-dsl-span-or-query.html](http://www.elasticsearch.org/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/0.90/query-dsl-span-or-query.html)
---
### Author:  [@system](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/system)
#### Post date: [July 6, 2017, 1:19am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/workaround-for-using-wild-cards-in-phrases-and-proximity-searches-elastic-search/18361/2 "2017-07-06T01:19:24Z")